The long operative chain leading to a final stacking and despatch of vegetable and fruit produce ends with the stacking of the wooden crates or cartons containing the produce on pallets.
Pallets are generally parallelepiped in shape and of a standardized size, and have a wooden support base. A whole assembly including the base and a predetermined number of crates stacked on them is normally referred to by the term pallet.
Once the cartons or crates have been stacked on the pallet bases, a way has to be found to render the whole stable. This is usually done through a strapping operation, consisting in winding a stiff strap around the pallet using a strapping machine for a predetermined number of circuits at various heights.
The alignment of the crates on the bases is never perfect, however, and edges may project from the hypothetical and ideal surface, leading to imperfections in the tightness of the strapping which, during transport of the produce, might cause loss of pallet stability.
To obviate this occurrence, during the strapping operation right-angled members, known as angle bars, are applied to the pallets and the strapping is performed around these.
The above is normally a manual task and requires the presence of at least one person to position the angle members with an elastic band or sticky tape, while the strapping machine performs a sufficient number of circuits to hold the angle members in position.
Obviously, this is a lengthy task and is wasteful of operator time.
The principal aim of the present invention is to obviate the above-mentioned drawbacks. The invention, as characterized in the claims that follow, solves the problem by automatizing the angle member application.